CAMPANULACEAE BLUEBELL FAMILY 
TALL BELLFLOWER 
Campanula americana L. 
Among the plants of this economically unimportant family 
which are cultivated for their beautiful flowers are the Canter- 
bury Bells, the Bluebells and the Bellflowers. The Tall Bellflower 
is found in moist woods and thickets 
from New Brunswick to Ontario and 
South Dakota, south to Florida and 
Kansas. 
It is an annual or biennial herb 
with a rather slender and usually un- 
branched stem that grows 2-6 feet 
high. The leaves, 3-6 inches long, are 
thin and all but the uppermost are 
petioled. 
The light blue flowers are pro- 
duced from July to September in a 
terminal spike which may become 
1-2 feet long. The tubular calyx is 
grown fast to the ovary and is 5-lobed 
above. The wheel-shaped corolla is 
deeply 5-cleft and the 5 stamens are 
attached at its 
base. The style is 
curved upward and 
the stigma is 3- Sg 
lobed. The fruit is 
a capsule which 
opens near the top 
by 3 small holes. 
y 
In the extreme northern part of 
the state the Harebell or Bluebell, 
Campanula rotundifolia L., is found. 
This is a perennial 6-36 inches high. 
The basal leaves are round-heart shaped, 
slender petioled, toothed or entire and 
often absent at flowering time, but the stem leaves are narrow, 
mostly entire and sessile. The beautiful blue flowers are distinctly 
bell shaped, nearly 1 inch long, and drooping or spreading on slender 
pedicels in a racemose inflorescence. The spreading awl-shaped calyx 
lobes are much longer than the short-top-shaped tube. The pendu- 
lous ribbed capsule opens by pores at the base. 
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